“This is the first Social Security trustees report that begins to take Donald Trump’s second term policies into account: A tax bill that largely benefited the wealthy, economy-wrecking tariffs, a needless war with Iran, and hostility to immigrants. All of these have reduced the amount of money going into Social Security, weakening the system’s finances.
Despite Trump’s damaging policies, Social Security remains fully affordable if the wealthy are required to contribute their fair share. Congress has only two options to address the projected shortfall: Bring more money into Social Security, or cut benefits. Any politician who refuses to raise revenue, including by making the wealthy pay their fair share into Social Security, is telling us that they support benefit cuts.
The American people, including Republicans, are overwhelming in their opposition to even a penny of benefit cuts. Support for means-testing and other benefit cuts (even if paired with revenue increases) is a betrayal of the American people.
Social Security’s future is on the ballot. Any of the U.S. Senators elected this November could become the deciding vote. Accordingly, all of them should tell the public how they would vote.
This is particularly important for Republican candidates, given that Speaker Mike Johnson just announced plans to ‘adjust and fix’ Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid next year. That’s DC-insider speak for ‘cut benefits.’ Outrageously, Johnson claims this is necessary to reduce the federal deficit — even though Social Security is an earned benefit that doesn’t add a single penny to the deficit!
As the Trustees Report plainly states, if there is insufficient revenue, Social Security benefits will be automatically cut. Johnson’s ‘solution’ is to cut them sooner (and likely by a larger amount) instead of making his billionaire donors pay their fair share. Sen. Ted Cruz and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent are more specific than Johnson, saying that the Republican plan for Social Security is privatization, handing Social Security over to Wall Street. Do Republican House and Senate candidates agree with Johnson, Cruz, and Bessent?
Ultimately, the Social Security shortfall is cause for action but not for undue alarm. Congress has acted to avert such shortfalls before and will again. When members of Congress act, they should listen to their voters who overwhelmingly value Social Security, not their ultra-wealthy donors who want to steal their voters’ hard-earned benefits out from under them.”
The following statement was issued by Richard Fiesta, Executive Director of the Alliance, regarding the Trustees’ reports on the Social Security and Medicare Trust Funds released today.
The report states that the Social Security Trust Fund is able to pay full benefits and expenses until 2032, while the Medicare Trust Fund is projected to remain solvent until 2033. If Congress does not make any changes, the Social Security Trust Fund will only be able to pay 78% of scheduled benefits to all current and future beneficiaries.
“The new Social Security Trustees Report serves as a warning. Congress must act to increase revenue into the Social Security system. This will prevent current and future beneficiaries from losing roughly $500 a month in Social Security benefits they have earned over a lifetime of work in just six years.
“The wrong response is to continue down President Trump and congressional Republicans’ path: passing tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans that undermine Social Security's finances, and implementing tariffs and policies that harm our economy and put Americans out of work, while laying the groundwork to gut the program through benefit cuts, a higher retirement age, and privatization.
“The right solution is simple, has broad support from the majority of Americans, and would fix Social Security's finances for the next 75 years. Today the wealthiest Americans benefit from a loophole that lets them stop paying Social Security tax after the first $184,500 they earn while the rest of us pay on every dollar we make.
“This loophole is indefensible. Millionaires and billionaires should pay into Social Security at the same rate as everyone else. Closing this loophole would mean a strong, solvent Social Security for the next 75 years.”
“A bankrupt Social Security system is not inevitable, and Americans should reject these scare tactics. However, any politician who refuses to make the wealthy pay their fair share is actively supporting cuts to earned benefits.”
“We also urge Congress and the Administration to strengthen Medicare’s finances by allowing Medicare to negotiate lower prices for more prescription drugs, holding Medicare Advantage insurance corporations accountable, and cracking down on practices that increase corporate profits without improving patient care.”
Bad Men Behaving Badly Chap. 746: 'Cause it's not awful enough we have to endure the racist crap spewing from our home-grown jackasses, the rest of the world just bore grim witness to it as dunk-tank Christofascist Pete Hegseth chose a D-Day remembrance to flip the script on World War 2, trash European allies for not being fascist enough, and liken (good-guy) Allies landing at Normandy to an "invasion" of brown people "with "dangerous ideologies." Fact: "This is repulsive and confused, unless you're a Nazi."
Speaking of: Last week, under cover of darkness, "shameful" Senate Republicans pushed through a "Secure America Act" (sic) gifting yet more billions to keep out more of the swarthy hordes Pete's so scared of. Without making any of the reforms Dems had demanded, they added to last year's obscene $191 billion gift to DHS another $75 billion for ICE and $65 billion for CBP, 4 to 7 times their previous budgets, with most allocated to expand detentions, deportations, facilities, goons - not, as it could, to fund free childcare for over a million kids, groceries for over 10 million households, a year of SNAP benefits to 31 million people, health care tax credits for a year etc etc ad nauseum. Their wise leader, meanwhile, was throwing tantrums on TV - "Dude is losing his shit" - because a reporter dared ask for evidence of his flood of unhinged claims.
And greasy "Secretary of War (Crimes)" Pete lurches along on his quest to turn America into a white nationalist theocracy. A buffoon of a warmonger though (because?) he never saw combat, he posts klutzy videos of himself working out; in one, he prances in a “This Is War” t-shirt. (No, this is reality TV). Sporting Crusader tattoos - Deus Vult, but whose God? - he stripped 180 unholy faiths from those the military recognizes despite a First Amendment ensuring "the free exercise of religion for everybody" - a religious purge dressed up as paperwork (telling) thousands of service members their beliefs don’t matter to the government they’re risking their lives to protect.” (After outrage, he restored the Mormons.) He cut dozens of female and Black Navy officers from leadership-approved promotions, dissing “historic so-called firsts” that make the military “less lethal.”
And to mark this weekend's 82nd anniversary of the June 6, 1944 D-Day landing of Allied forces on the beaches of Normandy - perhaps the most pivotal moment in a long bloody fight to defend democracy against fascism - he gave a pro-fascism speech, embracing a Great Replacement theory that calls for a return to the racial ideology on which fascism is based. Speaking at the American Cemetery in north-west France where about 9,400 are buried, he'd barely recalled the courage of Allied Forces from multiple countries wading ashore in history's largest amphibious operation to liberate Europe before pivoting to warn "their legacy requires our active vigilance." European leaders may have grown too "comfortable," he said with the chutzpah of the deeply ignorant, and they may have somehow "forgotten that freedom is not free."
"Sadly, today, different European beaches are stormed by different, dangerous ideologies," he intoned. "On beaches in Spain, Italy, Greece and Bulgaria, boats and men arrive....When will European capitals do something about that invasion? Is it too late? I pray not, and I believe not." What a pompous asshole. So: On D-Day, Ugly Americans hawking xenophobia. Equating brown-skinned migrants who want to feed and keep safe their families with "dangerous ideologies." Also: Equating anti-fascism with "dangerous ideologies"? Wait, weren't the Allies the good guys? And wait, so the Nazis were...? Americans were horrified by so much repulsive and confused: "Sewage," "straight-up white nationalism," "a cheap suit full of hate and racism - what an evil shit," "Crystal Meth Rumsfeld strikes again," "We get it, dude. Just come out and say you hate black and brown people."
Especially in Europe, critics did not hold back, and we are here for it. English historian Simon Schama decried Hegseth's "special kind of loathsomeness, a blend of historical deafness, grotesque stupidity and comically ludicrous self-importance...As if the little people’s rage against immigration somehow is superior to the war against the 3rd Reich, and entitles this comic-book nobody to lecture the actual heroes." Others blasted "something profoundly ugly happening" in our right wing..."and on D-Day, D-Day!" and "an obscene desecration" of the memories of those who fell. Like many, French P.M. Sébastien Lecornu rightly paid tribute instead to the "3,000 men, barely 20 years old," who died, offering "the breath of their youth and the sacrifice of their lives."
Europeans also called bullshit on the faux drama and utter hypocrisy of Hegseth's angry claim that, after a united D-Day era when "each nation bled," Europe is not "standing with" a U.S. now run by a lying, racist, narcissistic, war-mongering toddler who does nothing but abuse them. "America will lead and we must, but capable allies must be Right. There. With Us...In the Breach. When It Matters," he bloviated. "The men who fought and died here restored freedom to Europe,. Now freedom must be maintained by this generation of leaders and war-fighters...We stand by our allies, and we expect our allies to stand beside us." "So much nonsense," retorted Swedish economist Anders Åslund. "'We stand by our allies!’ No you don’t. You just attacked them. Immigration policies are internal matters... Doesn’t Hegseth know the most unreliable ‘ally’ by far is the US?”
And now, in the name of their mythical, bigoted, white, male, Christian Republic, the US - Hegseth, Trump, Vance et al - have the audacity to be hectoring their European “allies” to “up their white supremacy game” to stop an “invasion” of what Trump has called the brown and black “vermin” who once flocked to our “shining city on a hill,” now a beacon of hate. Hamlet's ghost: “O, what a falling-off was there.” Last weekend, in France, Hegseth didn’t even stay for the international ceremony at the cemetery where so many are buried - per Trump, all those suckers and losers. Pete likely didn’t know the denizens of a nearby village had weeks earlier asked that his visit be cancelled. "It seems to us," they said in their request, "that this man does not share our democratic values." We feel your pain.
Today, more than 325 organizations including labor unions, advocates for seniors and people with disabilities, women’s rights organizations, and more, released an open letter to those seeking to reform the health care system, laying out why now is the time for Medicare for All.
The letter is led by Public Citizen, National Nurses United, People’s Action Institute, Social Security Works, Physicians for a National Health Program, Labor Campaign for Single Payer, and Healthcare-NOW. Other signatories include Indivisible, MoveOn, and several prominent labor unions, including UAW, APWU, IFPTE, AFA-CWA, UE, Actors Equity, and more.
Medicare for All is overwhelmingly popular and commands majority support nationwide, with 63 percent of all voters in favor, including 90 percent of Democratic voters. In Congress, more than half of the House Democratic Caucus now supports Medicare for All, and Senate legislation has added three co-sponsors since the last Congress.
Some D.C. insiders are urging members of Congress and health care advocates to think small and prioritize incremental health care tweaks. This letter is a clear warning that half-measures will not meet the scale of the health care crisis. As health care costs soar, affordability is top of mind for American families, and it's a particularly important kitchen table issue ahead of the 2026 midterms. The American people need, and demand, Medicare for All.
The letter reads, in part:
“We may face a once-in-a-generation opportunity to legislate on health care in 2029. We need to rally behind the boldest possible reform, Medicare for All, that brings together the broadest possible movement. Now is not the time for overly complex incremental measures that prop up the same systems we’re seeing fail under the weight of attacks by Trump and Republicans. The American people are hungry for bold ideas that will transform fundamental institutions that have failed them for too long. And they are looking for leaders who will take on powerful interests and fight for working people.
Now is the time to organize and inspire! Support for Medicare for All grows daily in our communities and in Congress. It’s our best path forward, and it’s rooted in real promise: everybody in, nobody out. A small minority of skeptical health care policy wonks may try to convince us to scale back, that structural change isn’t winnable.
The reality is that alternate proposals don’t move us towards Medicare for All, complicate our already broken system, and allow corporations to continue profiting off the sick.”
"The massive momentum for Medicare for All should serve as a wakeup call to all who profit from our broken health care system and those who do their bidding," said Public Citizen Health Care Policy Advocate Eagan Kemp. "Everyday Americans are tired of watching the pigs at the health care trough gorge themselves day after day while hundreds of millions of people in the wealthiest country in the world suffer from inadequate access to care, delays and denials, and crushing medical debt. Medicare for All would end the ability of corporations to put greed ahead of people's needs and would finally guarantee than everyone in the U.S. can get the care they require. The movement for Medicare for All is growing by leaps and bounds because the people are demanding change. It is time those in power meet the moment and fight for the health care system we need and that the people are demanding, Medicare for All."
Exciting news, patriots! After cancelling his OG concert, Dear Leader will now celebrate our 250th birthday with "the Greatest Rally, EVER!" featuring the "fabulous" 83-year-old Lee Greenwood and “a fine and highly dignified gentleman," himself. Also, for some reason, "prune-face" Bruce Springsteen and a gazillion A-list performers are holding two concerts to honor America's "songs that shaped us." Reviews call it "a rare gift" in music history, but they're all losers and lunatics.
Taking time off from nodding off (again) in a meeting, Trump as predicted has finally cancelled his much-hyped “Freedom 250 concert of has-beens and never-weres after almost all nine acts bailed; poor Vanilla Ice, reportedly the only, desperate act still ready to go on. The concerts were set to kick off his equally-fab-sounding Great American State Fair, a "once in a generation...State Fair like no other" - "Dive into the fun and feel the energy" - hosting carnival rides, "hands-on partner activations" from each state, and daily workshops with titles like Land & Prosperity, Family Life and Community Support, Everyday Health and Well Being with MAHA Monday, and Faith, Values, and Inspiration.
Trump was his usual chivalrous self in defeat after the concert went down in tacky flames. "We don't want singers with no talent, but big fees to put you to sleep," he wrote. "We’ve told them all to stay home." Instead, he giddily announced “a Rally to end all Rallies!" in "magnificent Washington D.C, now totally beautified." Because, "All we want is you, me, a few speakers, and the Greatest Music ever played, the same Music you have listened to for years!" it will feature die-hard Lee Greenwood (again), with "one of the Greatest Hits of All Time," his 1984 God Bless the U.S.A, after which he will introduce "a fine and highly dignified gentleman known as President DONALD J. TRUMP!”
There's more: The "amazing" opera singer Christopher Macchio, who has just 571 listeners on Spotify, will join in."Not since the legendary Luciano Pavarotti has there been such a voice!” bragged Trump, though Pavarotti’s family has protested his use of the opera great's songs by arguing, "The values of brotherhood and solidarity which Luciano Pavarotti expressed throughout (his) artistic career are entirely incompatible with the worldview offered by Trump.” Also, the U.S. Army Band, Armed Forces Choir and "The President’s Own United States Marine Band" will perform “all your favorite Hits." Observers say the gig "sounds lame as fuck," but MAGA fans who go to every rally "like Deadheads with less weed and more racism" will probs love it.
Amidst other glad fails - even UFC fighters have trashed him with Star Wars rants of "Darth Vader gonna get took (sic) down" - many deem a more apt celebration of America's birthday the June 4 and 5 concerts in New Jersey by Springsteen and many fellow musicians. The guest list is so vast and illustrious - among them, Bon Jovi, Jackson Browne, Rosanne Cash, Kenny Chesney, Tom Morello, Gary Clark Jr., Dion, Dropkick Murphys, Shemekia Copeland, Keb’ Mo’, Nils Lofgren, Valerie June, Darlene Love, Public Enemy, David Sancious, Tony Trischka, Sister Sadie, Mavis Staples, Trombone Shorty, Steve Van Zandt, Jimmie Vaughan, the New Breed Brass Band - it's assumed Bruce called in favors: "They were beckoned, and graciously agreed."
Springsteen and the E Street Band just wrappedtheir Land of Hope and Dreams Tour - "No Kings" plastered below - in Philadelphia. Celebrating "hope over fear," it featured his most fiery political songs: Born in the USA, Death To My Hometown, No Surrender, Darkness On the Edge of Town, Streets of Minneapolis, Dylan's Chimes of Freedom. The two new concerts, titled Music America: The Songs that Shaped Us, are likewise unabashedly rabble-rousing. Held in Springsteen's Jersey backyard at Monmouth University, they will also launch the new Bruce Springsteen Center for American Music, which aims to preserve the Boss' legacy and offer "a journey through American music history" with ongoing exhibitions, archives and workshops.
This week's concerts, says Robert Santelli, "reflect everything theCenter stands for" - the power of "a rich and diverse treasury of American music (to) bring people together (and) the inspiration to think about our shared history in divisive times." Casting a wide and joyful net, artists perform landmark songs from American music - blues, bluegrass, Native, rock, hip-hop, folk, jazz, country, gospel. Tickets are reasonably priced for an intimate venue, and brief narration before each performance offers context to the artist, song, and genre. Thursday night reviews praised "a magical, once-in-a-lifetime moment in music history" and a nod to "how powerful music is in telling our nation’s story." Both concerts sold out.
Bruce and the Dropkick Murphys' rousing rendition ofAmerican Land, based on a 19th-century poem by an immigrant steelworker, which asks and celebrates those "who will make his home in the American Land." In brief, all of us.
The McNicholases, the Posalskis, the Smiths, Zerillis, too The Blacks, the Irish, Italians, the Germans and the Jews They come across the water a thousand miles from home With nothing in their bellies but the fire down below.
After Bill Pulte’s appointment, Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) has conspicuously failed to join the chorus of Democrats and Republicans calling for reforms to FISA that would protect privacy and democracy itself. Pulte’s history of weaponizing the government against President Donald Trump’s political enemies was jarring enough to move previous opponents of FISA privacy protections, like Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV), to explicitly call for “reforms to ensure Americans’ privacy and rights are protected.” On the other hand, Warner, who is negotiating with Republicans and the Trump administration to renew FISA, has only commented on how bad Pulte is and notably stopped short of saying anything about FISA reform. This is particularly telling considering Warner’s history of promising future reforms to get FISA renewed and failing to deliver.
The following is a statement from Demand Progress Executive Director Sean Vitka:
“Sen. Warner’s opposition to Bill Pulte masks the fact that he is still the Democrats’ chief advocate for handing over unchecked spying powers to the Trump administration. Pulte obviously must go, but he’s also proof that this administration is eager and willing to use the Office of the Director of National Intelligence as a weapon. If Trump pulls Pulte, he can easily appoint another eager goon to fill the slot. By focusing on Pulte and not broader reforms, Sen. Warner is not standing up for Americans or the Constitution, he is disguising his work to engineer warrantless mass surveillance against us. We know this because he’s been doing it publicly for months. An unprecedented, bipartisan movement is demanding privacy reforms but Sen. Warner’s machinations threaten to derail this progress and hand Trump the surveillance powers he needs to threaten Americans and democracy itself for the rest of his administration.”
A robust set of resources on the need for privacy reforms for FISA are available here and here, and additional background, context, polling, reform demands, resources and other information is available here. A video on Pulte from Jessica Craven can be found here and a sample of the ways FISA has been used to wrongfully target protesters, journalists, politicians and others is available here.
Responding to a new warning from the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) that El Niño conditions are strengthening and likely to drive more extreme weather in the coming months.
Anne Jellema, Executive Director of 350.org, said:
El Niño is a naturally occurring climate pattern , but its impacts are now being intensified by human-driven climate change caused by burning fossil fuels. As global temperatures rise, El Niño events are becoming more dangerous, amplifying heatwaves, floods, droughts and wildfires, and putting lives and livelihoods at greater risk around the world.
El Niño is not new , but the conditions we are experiencing today are. Fossil fuel pollution is loading the dice, turning a natural climate cycle into a far more dangerous force. Now is the time to prepare. But preparedness alone is not enough. We must urgently tackle the root cause by phasing out fossil fuels and holding polluters accountable.
A permanent windfall tax on fossil fuel companies could help countries protect lives and livelihoods as climate impacts intensify. This is also a moment for global cooperation , because no country can face this crisis alone.”
350.org is calling for urgent global action to rapidly phase out fossil fuels, scale up support for climate adaptation, and ensure those most responsible for the crisis contribute to the solutions.
Amidst the ongoing awful, we take wary solace in the modest routs newly inflicted on our wannabe Great Dictator. He lost yugely in multiple courts as judges reopened his bogus IRS suit, froze his slush fund, ripped his name from a D.C. landmark and, in Kenya, told him to take care of his own. Meanwhile, his trashy shitshow of a 250th celebration has devolved into "red-meat-for-the-rubes" blood sport and a dud of a concert after most of the low-rent performers bailed because, "Nobody wants the stink."
The buffoon who would be king keeps trying and flailing to rise to the authoritarian task in a spiraling presidency in free fall. Seeking to regain control of the narrative, he continues lashing out in increasingly deranged ways: After months of courts blocking his efforts to get state voter lists to steal elections, his Postal Service has proposed a Hail Mary move of only sending mail-in ballots to voters registered with the feds; he's proposed sweeping changes that would allow his toadies to kill NIH and other grants vaguely not "aligned with" his "priorities"; fighting for the dubious right to go after enemies like sacking James Comey's daughter from a New York U.S. Attorney’s Office, he's argued he has the power to fire anyone, even for pure political malice, which the latest court to shut him down called "a novel and breathtaking theory" about presidential power.
To deflect from the stubbornly enduring issue of pedo bestie Epstein, he's reflexively pivoted to his once-winning scapegoat of immigrants with maybe the most racist and "lamest shit ever": A website declaiming, "THEY WALK AMONG US" of "millions of illegals who have arrived under the cover of darkness and embedded themselves directly into our society." Complete with "alien arrest map” and more AI slopaganda - a UFO lifts a man over a wall as YMCA plays WTF - the text hisses that, for years, "Aliens (have) shopped in the same stores, attended the same classes (and) and lived seemingly normal human existences. With one exception — They do not belong here," all until when one "bold" bigot had "the courage (to) call out the real danger Aliens pose" to every American family and community. Alas, notes Dem. Gov. Ned Lamont, "We are still looking for intelligent life in the White House.”
Other horrors go on. Agriculture Sec. Brooke Rollins - net worth $15 million - boasted thanks to $186 billion in long-term cuts they’ve “lifted” 4 million hungry people off SNAP benefits so they can now achieve “the American Dream”; though cuts were in the name of “fraud,” she admitted they “don’t have actual data” (in reality zilch) got people “kick(ed) down the elevator shaft.” "Testifying" before the House, Pam Bondi threw her deputy under Epstein's bus, refused to answer questions and argued it was "not appropriate" to acknowledge survivors standing behind her. Bald mini-Nazi Stephen Miller sneered Texas' James Talarico (cis, straight, meat-eating) was the Dems' "first transgender Senate candidate." When Dems retorted, "Shut up you ugly fuck,” Miller's wife blasted "violent rhetoric." Chill Talarico: "I'm an 8th generation Texan - I've been eating BBQ since before Ken Paxton's first indictment."
Sadist Greg Bovino crawled out of his fetid cave to tell Nazis at a “Remigration Summit” in Portugal he is now “in battle” against MAGA cowards who have “lost their will” to deport brown people: “Mullin’s a great plumber...But a hundred million illegal aliens is not a leaky faucet.” Vietnam has had to exhume bodies from ancestral gravesites to make room for a shitty new Trump golf course and hotel supposedly at another site; one 72-year-old is “outraged” the U.S. paid him just $2,660 compensation for the grievous removal of his son and parents. Always classy, Trump also just posted more AI garbage, literally: He throws Colbert into a dumpster and portrays Obama’s presidential library as a giant trash can. And displaying their usual lofty priorities, Minnesota Republicans at their state convention held a moment of silence to honor...George Floyd's killer Derek Chauvin.
In glad contrast, many judges are holding the line against the darkness and stupidity. The law, and the justice it can bring, inevitably moves more slowly and quietly than the atrocities we're daily bombarded with. But it is moving, and last week several judges took the ball and damn near ran with it toward MLK's blessed arc of justice. In perhaps the least substantive but most killingly symbolic move, Judge Christopher Cooper of the U.S. District Court in D.C. ruled the boy-king can't just slap his name on the Kennedy Center when his fragile ego needs a boost. Rejecting a final, desperate board "argument" the removal of the world's most despised name would render the Center "financially nonviable" (add many LOLs here), Cooper found "no competent evidence" and ruled the Center's statute "makes crystal clear" no name can be added to it without Congress' approval.
In his decision, a response to a lawsuit brought by much-abused Dem ex-officio Board member Rep. Joyce Beatty after Trump brazenly hijacked the Board and chairmanship in 2025 - prompting pretty much any sensible performers to abandon it - Cooper ruled the foul Trump stain must come off everything - building facade, website, materials - within two weeks. An unexpected cherry on top: Cooper also found the Board was "derelict in discharging (its) responsibilities to the Center” when it voted to close it for two years of Trump's suddenly announced "renovations," and no they can't exclude Dem members, like Beatty from decisions, because democracy. Kennedy niece Maria Shriver offered a "Translation: "Due to the name change...no one wants to perform there any longer, so it's best to close it and build a new one so everybody will stop talking about that."
Ever gracious, the world's worst loser responded with a fuming, whining, 700-word tantrum. "There has never been a (boy-king) treated so unfairly by the Courts as I,” he wailed. "Unless I am free to do what I do better than anyone else, and bring this failing Institution" - rust, rot, rats oh my! - back," he has "no interest" and will transfer said empty shell back to Congress. He also attacked both "Trump-Hating Barack Hussein Obama Judge Cooper" and his wife, a former Dem federal prosecutor, who "probably told him to do so!" Cooper "has a total Conflict of Interest," he raved, "and should be brought up on charges for not revealing these facts." God, still a prince among men. Former Rep. Joe Kennedy III: JFK "would remind us it is not buildings that define the greatness of a nation. It is the actions of its people and its leaders...and our commitment to the rights of all.”
Now judges are also coming down hard on his "felon-to-felon" slush fund. A federal judge in Virginia just froze its scuzzy $1.8 billion until a June hearing; Judge Leonie M. Brinkema barred any action “pursuant to (its) creation or operation" because "taxpayer dollars should not reward blind, and sometimes violent, loyalty to a single politician." Her ruling came as Democracy Forwardfiled another legal challenge charging "blatant abuse of power." Too bad, so sad: Now MAGA cronies, including dozens of convicted Jan. 6 thugs since charged or convicted for serious new crimes - child sex abuse, rape, burglary, home invasion, death threats against officials, fatal DUI crashes - may have to wait for their payouts. Even then, state Dem lawmakers - New York and New Jersey Assembly members, Gavin Newsom et al - plan to slap 100% taxes on them, with the House and Senate to wisely follow suit.
Digging even deeper in the Southern District of Florida, Judge Kathleen Williams just re-opened Trump's bullshit $10 billion lawsuit against himself - his DOJ vs IRS - after three dozen bipartisan retired judges filed a motion against his "fraud on the Court." Friday, Williams ordered Trump to respond to charges his suit, from which he laundered his billion-dollar-plus payout and lifetime audit immunity, was "premised on deception" to "avoid judicial scrutiny of a lawsuit collusive from the start." Even Kenyan courts are rejecting his outrageous schemes. After gutting international aid and facing an Ebola outbreak in DRC that's killed hundreds, Trump moved to simply bar immigrants or Americans who might have it and send them to...Kenya? As they scrambled to replicate in days care the US built over decades, the day the clinic was set to open a Kenyan court blocked a plan that, like all his others, "raises grave constitutional concerns."
Other woes, born of his boundless incompetence, beset him: At a DOJ rapidly spiraling down, the lead prosecutor for the absurd James Comey Seditious Seashell case just withdrew; experts agree it'll never make it to court. His grifty, flaking, no-bid paint job on Lincoln's Reflecting Pool - from sober grey to tacky motel pool blue - has soared from $1.8 to $13.1 million skimmed from National Park entrance fees and is getting trashed. Five countries from his Board of Peace (sic), which promised 20,000 troops to help "ease Gaza’s transition to a peaceful Jared Kushner theme park," has delivered no troops, no money, nada. His beloved gazillion-dollar ballroom remains a rubble-strewn hole in the ground amidst "a busted-ass trash palace" after another judge ruled "no statute comes close" to giving him the authority to build it. And Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin rocket exploded on its Florida launchpad; NYT Pitchbotwarns of new layoffs at The Washington Post.
Finally, whaaa, nobody wants to come to his birthday party and "testament to his vision to celebrate America’s monumental 250th anniversary" with the lamest, trashiest, most corrupt and barbarous show on earth, even though after heedlessly turning the White House environs into a hoarders' trailer park he then plastered the city with banners proclaiming, "We are making D.C. safe and beautiful" Maybe the whole, crude debacle, "our latest national concussion," stems from the fact - just hear us out - a Malignant-Narcissist-In-Chief has made America's anniversary "about one hideous thing - himself." Starting with the grotesque call to mark the date by "watching men beat each other senseless in a cage on the same grounds where Lincoln walked." It's gladiatorial bread and circus - food and fun to dispel questions about empire - but "he's keeping the circus and taking away the bread."
His UFC match, with day-trading on the side, will feature combatants pummeling each other often to bloody pulp in a "sport" so violent John McCain called it “human cockfighting"; many states banned it at its inception, though its almost non-existent rules now prohibit gouging out opponents' eyes. It's an unsettling but unsurprising choice from a long "violence-curious" (except in Vietnam) bully who weirdly wears more makeup and hairspray than your average drag queen while urging supporters to beat up protesters, joking about extrajudicial killings, and injecting inane bing-bong noises into descriptions of missile strikes. Decades ago, he tried to create a mixed-martial-arts brand with a brutal fighter named Fedor the Russian: "His thing is inflicting death on people." It became Affliction Entertainment - really - but crashed after two fights, because everything he touches, even that, dies.
As a ghastly arena rises on the White House lawn, Trump is clearly hyped by the approaching blood-fest: "I have never seen anybody want anything so much as people want those tickets.” So is his wife-slapping accomplice and $3-million donor UFC CEO Dana White, who admits, "It’s really big for the brand." About 4,000 supporters will watch in person, with Trump as usual likely close enough ringside to be splattered by blood and sweat. Another 85,000 can watch on giant screens from the Ellipse, home to the Jan. 6 "rally." The Pentagon is reportedly recruitinghundreds of troops to attend in uniform, but no fatties please; they must meet height and weight requirements to "look good on camera." They also have to pay for their own travel. In another classy move, sharp-eyed observers note that renderings of the event show an American flag with just 48 stars.
At last count the other big event, a Freedom 250 concert kicking offa 16-day "Great American State Fair," will feature just two stars - or more accurately two bargain-bin, has-been-or-never-were performers, the only survivors of nine originally announced of which seven quickly dropped out. (Oof. Was it something/everything he said?) They were Young MC, Flo Rida, Bret Michaels, Morris Day & The Time, The Commodores, Vanilla Ice, "real” Milli Vanilli Fab Morvan, Martina McBride and Freedom Williams of C+C Music Factory. Full Disclosure: We haven't heard of any of them. Michaels evidently won Celebrity Apprentice in 2010, McBride's a four-time CMA Award winner who's sold 23 million albums and performed for multiple presidents, Morvan's the surviving member of a pretty pair of guys brought low by a lip-syncing scandal. Honestly, we dunno who the others are.
Within 48 hours of them being announced, most had cancelled. They cited “misleading information,” “divisive” or partisan politics, miscommunication; a couple said they’d never been contacted in the first place. Reportedly remaining are Flo Rida, Fab Morvan and possibly Freedom Williams, or, per Dean Blundell, "one nostalgia rapper, one lip-syncer with intellectual-property issues, and a guy ranting from a toilet" - that would be Williams, who filmed a seven-minute rant about "niggers," "motherfuckers," and how he doesn't give a fuck about Trump or the rest of us but after the Internet told him to bail he thought he'd fuck them all and play. Despite a broad consensus that watching the entire show as planned would be akin to "staring into a septic tank for hours," MAGA was pissed at the drop-outs, especially McBride, the headliner, railing she'd even performed for "the Obama regime."
Trump was gracious about the changes. Just kidding. In "prime wallow," he railed against "these highly paid, Third Rate ‘Artists'...getting the yips," and said he's thinking instead about "bringing the Number One Attraction anywhere in the World, the man who gets much larger audiences than Elvis in his prime, and he does so without a guitar...the man who some say is the Greatest President in History" to give a speech at a "wild MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN RALLY" with "Only Great Patriots invited." While even supporters griped another speech instead of a concert would be "lame and boring," nobody knows what latest chaos will befall the event. What many of us do know is that all the detritus of this shameful historic moment - the names, arches, gimcracks, breaches, endless cruelties of a tyrant's resolve to "impose himself on the world" must go. With a nod to Walter White, we look to Ozymandias, a poem "to outlast empires," for hope and guidance.
Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand, Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
And on the pedestal these words appear: "My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!" Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away.
The right to strike is under attack throughout the world, including in the United States. Labor strikes are currently forbidden or restricted in the majority of countries.
“At a moment when workers’ organizations face sustained attacks around the world, this opinion reaffirms that the freedom to withhold one’s labor is not a privilege granted by the powerful, but a fundamental human right grounded in international law,” AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler said in a statement.
The ILO is the United Nations agency that sets global labor standards. It has 187 member states and has adopted 191 conventions since its founding in 1919. The ILO considers Convention No. 87 to be one of its 11 fundamental conventions.
In 2023, the ILO asked the ICJ to settle an internal dispute about whether Convention No. 87 gives workers the right to strike, which is not specifically addressed in the convention. Although advisory opinions of the ICJ are not legally binding, many courts accept them as authoritative legal decisions.
The ICJ ruled in its 10-4 opinion that a strike “is one of the main activities engaged in and tools used by workers and their organizations to promote their interests and improve conditions of labour, thereby ensuring the effective exercise of the freedom of association protected under Convention No. 87.”
The Court found “that protection of the right to strike is encompassed in the protection of the freedom of association provided for in Convention No. 87.”
In reaching that conclusion, the Court considered provisions in two 1996 Covenants that contain relevant rules of international law regarding the right to strike. Both refer to Convention No. 87.
Article 22, paragraph 1 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) provides for the right to freedom of association. The ICJ noted that for more than 25 years, the Human Rights Committee — which monitors the implementation of the ICCPR — has considered the right to strike to be encompassed in the protection of freedom of association.
Due to the high degree of overlap between the states parties to the ICESCR and ICCPR, and Convention No. 87, the ICJ determined there was a common understanding among them on the right to strike. The Court thus concluded “that an interpretation taking into account the relevant rules of international law contained in the ICESCR and the ICCPR indicates that the protection of the right to strike is encompassed in the protection of the freedom of association provided by Convention No. 87.”
No Right to Organize Without the Right to Strike
“For generations, working people have understood a simple truth: The freedom to join a union means nothing if you cannot withhold your labor when bosses refuse to listen. Now, the world’s highest court has affirmed that truth,” said Jeffrey Vogt, director of the International Lawyers Assisting Workers (ILAW) Network, which issued the call for the ILO referral of this case to the ICJ.
The ICJ decision “affirms decades of judicial precedent and what workers around the world know: there is no right to organize and bargain collectively without the right to strike,” Shuler said in her statement. “When workers are barred from taking collective action on the job, they cannot defend their rights and demand the workplace conditions and contracts they are owed. The freedom to join a union becomes an empty formality.”
“This is an important day for the International Labor Organization [ILO], and for its continued relevance in the world of work. However, the significance of this opinion extends well beyond the institutional context in Geneva,” the ILAW Network wrote in a statement.
The ICJ advisory opinion came “at a moment of acute pressure on the international labour rights system,” ILAW stated. “Across the world, the right to strike is under sustained attack — through restrictive legislation, expansive judicial interpretation of essential services, the criminalisation of trade union activity, and the use of dismissals, injunctions, and damages claims to deter collective action.”
Legal restrictions on the right to strike are increasing. In 2022, strikes were outlawed or stringently restricted in 129 of the 148 countries tallied by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), one of the six organizations with consultative status at the ILO Governing Body.
The ITUC, which represents 191 million workers in 169 countries and territories, is dedicated to trade union democracy and independence. It has regional organizations in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The ICJ decision “is important not only for workers and trade unions, but also for governments and responsible businesses,” ITUC stressed.
This decision “will serve as a powerful interpretive tool before national constitutional and labour courts, before regional human rights bodies, and before the ILO’s own supervisory bodies,” ILAW noted. “It strengthens the hand of every worker and union challenging strike bans, broad essential-services designations, criminal sanctions against strikers, prohibitions on solidarity and political strikes, and the dismissal and blacklisting of workers who exercise this right.”
Ruling Will Affect Tens of Millions of Workers
In October, 18 countries and five international organizations, including the ILO, presented oral testimony before the ICJ, and other nations filed written contributions. The majority of participants supported the right to strike, which is guaranteed in most European countries.
Harold Koh, who represented the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) before the ICJ, told the judges that the case would “affect the real rights of tens of millions of working people around the world.” If the Court ruled that the Convention didn’t protect the right to strike, Koh warned, “National employer groups would contest the right to strike country by country, focusing first on nations with compliant courts, weak civil societies and ineffective media.”
Jeffrey Vogt worked with the legal team of the ITUC on the briefs and oral arguments presented to the ICJ. Vogt’s co-authored book, The Right to Strike in International Law, provided a legal roadmap for the case.
Vogt told Truthout that “the written view of the US (under the Biden administration) was to support the right to strike, albeit on narrower grounds than what we had argued. When the Trump administration came in, they withdrew the Biden era brief but fortunately did not appear for oral arguments and take a contrary view.”
“The decision deals with the right to strike in the abstract — does the convention protect it — but does not go into the modalities,” Vogt added. The Court wrote that its “conclusion that the right to strike is protected by Convention No. 87 does not entail any determination on the precise content, scope, or conditions for the exercise of that right.”
“That was a conscious decision,” Vogt noted. “We did not want the court to attempt to define the scope, especially since we believe that is the proper role of the ILO supervisory system.” Vogt said that “the ICJ gave ‘great weight’ to the views of the supervisory system, which is helpful.” And although “the ILO has supported secondary strikes,” in which workers strike in solidarity with other workers at a different employer, the ICJ decision didn’t opine on that specific issue.
The Right to Strike in the US
“The right to withhold one’s labor, inherent in the right to strike, belongs to all workers, but it has been restricted,” Jeanne Mirer, a labor lawyer in private practice working with the International Commission for Labor Rights, told Truthout. “Many unions have agreed never to strike while a collective bargaining agreement is in effect.”
Most private sector workers in the US have the right to strike under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). Employees, including international and undocumented workers, cannot be fired or disciplined for participating in a lawful strike.
“Those exempted from the NLRA, such as agricultural and domestic workers, are not restricted in the right to strike but have no protections against discharge if they strike and do not have the power to prevent such retaliation,” Mirer added.
Some states have their own laws granting protection to domestic workers and 14 states guarantee farmworkers collective bargaining rights.
Railroad and airline workers are not covered by the NLRA, but they come under the Railway Labor Act, which has several limitations on the right to strike.
In recent years, Congress and the courts have narrowed the definition of “protected concerted activity” under the NLRA. Union membership is dropping. Nevertheless, strike actions in the US increased by almost 50 percent in 2022, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
In 2023, the US Supreme Court weakened the legal protections for striking in Glacier Northwest, Inc. v. International Brotherhood of Teamsters, making it easier for employers to sue unions in state courts. Only Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented, writing, “The right to strike is fundamental to American labor law.” She noted:
Workers are not indentured servants, bound to continue laboring until any planned work stoppage would be as painless as possible for their masters. They are employees whose collective and peaceful decision to withhold their labor is protected by the [National Labor Relations Act] even if economic injury results.
The NLRA’s protections for private sector workers don’t extend to public sector employees. “Public employees in the United States have been restricted in many ways from striking,” Mirer said.
Federal workers are legally prohibited from striking. Thirty-six states prohibit public sector workers from striking. Three other states that haven’t addressed the issue would likely outlaw public sector strikes as well. In the 12 states where strikes are not per se unlawful, various preconditions must be met before workers can engage in strikes.
The World Federation of Trade Unions, which played a decisive role in the creation of Convention No. 87 in 1948, applauded the ICJ’s decision:
[I]t is clear that the existence of a class-oriented and militant trade union movement is the essential, decisive, and irreplaceable factor to ensure that the right to strike, as well as conventions, collective bargaining, labor laws, and workers’ achievements, are not merely empty words on paper but are implemented in practice. The WFTU reiterates its call for struggle in every country, sector, and workplace to safeguard the sacred right to strike in practice.
“It is up to workers and their organizations to build on the ICJ decision to ensure the right to strike can be an effective tool to build worker power,” Mirer said.
“Tonight, the municipality of Jerusalem and the Israeli Building Center are hosting a discriminatory event in which they plan to sell stolen Palestinian land, open to Jews only. This event is illegal under international law and has no place in New York City.
“Right now, Palestinians across the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem are being expelled from their homes through a coordinated campaign of state policy and settler violence. In East Jerusalem, families are being harassed and attacked while the developers hosting this event build luxury developments available to Jews only.
“The municipality of Jerusalem is directly involved in imposing and administering discriminatory apartheid policies, and should not be hosted anywhere in the city.
“As Jewish New Yorkers, we condemn the sale of stolen Palestinian land and we condemn racist housing practices that discriminate based on race, religion, and national origin. New Yorkers know the importance of fair housing practices and reject these racist events. We, along with Palestinian New Yorkers, know that apartheid practices have no place in New York City.”
Background Jerusalem Mayor Moshe Lion
The Mayor of Jerusalem will be in attendance at today’s event. He has publicly stated his intention to oversee the construction of at least 100,000 new housing units in Jerusalem, as part of a “Judaisation plan” for Jerusalem.
Illegal annexation in the West Bank
Israel is illegally annexing the West Bank at an unprecedented rate, resulting in over 50 attacks of settler violence and displacing nearly 1,700 Palestinians in the first three months of 2026 alone. The number of Palestinians displaced in early 2026 surpasses the total displaced in all of 2025. Land sales in New York City further contribute to this annexation.
The Center for Biological Diversity sued the state of Florida today to protect the Florida Everglades from dangerous air pollution released by the massive immigrant detention facility in Big Cypress National Preserve, cruelly named “Alligator Alcatraz.”
The Center is suing the Florida Division of Emergency Management over substantial, unpermitted pollution from diesel generators and other air-polluting equipment that have supported the facility since operations began in June 2025.
“Governor DeSantis continues to shamelessly pollute the fragile wetlands and pristine air critical to the health of Big Cypress while refusing to publicly commit to shutting down the facility,” said Ryan Maher, a staff attorney at the Center. “Every day this facility continues to operate is another day of harm to people, endangered species and the delicate wetlands that sustain life in the Everglades. We’re going to hold the state accountable until every dirty diesel generator is removed from the site.”
The lawsuit follows reports from vendors at the facility that the detention center will close in June. Despite these reports, the Florida Division of Emergency Management’s executive director, Kevin Guthrie, recently stated that he has not received a timeline for closure and that the facility could potentially be open for two years, or “maybe even longer depending on the needs of the federal government.”
On Tuesday, following an inspection of the facility, U.S. Rep. Maxwell Frost reported that there were still 655 people detained inside. He said he was told that after the facility is empty it could take 15 to 30 days to remove infrastructure from the site. Government officials have made no public commitment to close the facility.
Today’s lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, says the state is violating the federal Clean Air Act, which requires the agency to obtain an air permit for the equipment and activities that produce harmful air pollution. A fleet of industrial diesel generators powers the detention facility, including around-the-clock air conditioners, flood lighting and a staff village for up to 1,000 workers. The generators release dangerous air pollutants that harm human health and the environment, including benzene, formaldehyde, nitrogen oxides and particulate matter, on a site encircled by Big Cypress National Preserve.
These violations could lead to civil penalties for Florida of up to $124,426 per day of violation, which would be paid to the U.S. Treasury.
The Clean Air Act violation adds to other significant environmental violations Friends of the Everglades and the Center identified in their June 2025 lawsuit, joined by the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida, and the two groups’ July 2025 legal notice.
The detention center is surrounded on all sides by Big Cypress National Preserve, one of America’s first national preserves, which protects ecologically sensitive wetlands and a dozen endangered and threatened species, including Florida panthers, Florida bonneted bats and Everglade snail kites.
The reported plan to close the site by early June would be just days before the conservation groups and the Miccosukee Tribe can resume their June 2025 lawsuit against the Trump administration. The lawsuit had been stayed by a federal appeals court. In addition to violations of the National Environmental Policy Act, National Historic Preservation Act and state laws, the plaintiffs also notified the defendants of their intent to challenge violations of the Endangered Species Act, Clean Water Act and National Park Service Organic Act.
In the original June 2025 lawsuit, Friends of the Everglades and the Center, represented by Paul Schwiep, Scott Hiaasen, Earthjustice and Center attorneys, sued the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Florida Division of Emergency Management and Miami-Dade County to stop the project as it was being hastily built with zero environmental review. The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida, which has villages close to the unpermitted immigration detention facility, joined the lawsuit.
The Environmental Working Group praised Vermont for today becoming the first state in the nation to ban the use and sale of paraquat, one of the most toxic herbicides in the U.S., and one that’s linked to Parkinson’s disease and other serious health harms.
Gov. Phil Scott (R) signed the landmark legislation after the state Legislature passed it with strong bipartisan support. The new law makes Vermont the first to enact a statewide prohibition on the toxic weedkiller.
“We applaud Governor Scott and the champions in the legislature that made this moment possible that will protect all Vermonters, including farmers and children, from being exposed to this dangerous chemical,” said EWG Legislative Director Geoff Horsfield.
“With Vermont leading the way, states across the country now have a clear path to end the use of one of the most toxic herbicides still on the market,” said Horsfield. “This is a turning point in the effort to protect public health from a chemical that has been tied to devastating neurological harm.”
State Rep. Esme Cole (D-Windsor) and state Sen. Martine Gulick (D-Chittenden-Central District) championed their chambers’ versions of the bills.
EWG would also like to thank the leading organizations that supported the bill, including Vermont Public Interest Research Group, The Michael J. Fox Foundation, Parkinson’s Foundation, the American Parkinson Disease Association, the Vermont Natural Resources Council and others.
Vermont’s action is expected to intensify pressure on state policymakers throughout the country to restrict or eliminate use of the herbicide. Lawmakers in the nearby states of New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania are currently debating similar proposals.
“We urge elected leaders in New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and other states to move forward with their respective plans to ban the toxic weedkiller and build momentum to push more states to take action,” he added.
Several other states have introduced bills to ban paraquat, and California is considering new regulatory restrictions. These efforts are clear signs of escalating concern over the chemical’s well-documented health risks.
A growing body of research links exposure to an increased risk of Parkinson's disease, with additional evidence pointing to other serious health harms, including non-Hodgkin lymphoma and childhood leukemia.
American Federation of Government Employees National President Everett Kelley issued the following statement in response to a proposed rule by the Office of Personnel Management, to be published tomorrow in the Federal Register, that would require current and prospective employees at participating agencies to sign non-disclosure agreements as a condition of employment:
“OPM continues its efforts to silence federal employees. This proposed NDA is another attempt by the administration to purge the civil service of nonpartisan career employees and replace them with loyalists who won’t speak out against waste, fraud, and abuse. Federal employees do not surrender their First Amendment rights when they accept federal employment, and the public has a right to know about this administration’s abuses.
“OPM claims the form will be ‘optional’ for agencies to use and merely restates existing law. We know that will not be true. OPM will pressure agencies to make the NDA mandatory and then fire employees who refuse to sign it.
“Moreover, federal agencies already have extensive policies and procedures in place for preventing the unauthorized release of classified or privileged information. This proposed rule sweeps in an extraordinarily broad category of information, extending restrictions to the very material the public relies on to learn when an administration is causing harm. AFGE will submit comments on the proposed rule and urges OPM to withdraw it.”
Another Memorial Day: boasts, insults, "self-defense strikes," cheap clichés from a "Secretary of War" prattling about dead boys "delivered from the battlefield into the arms of a loving Lord and savior." Spare us. And maybe revisit the war to end all wars, which didn't - its "infinity of waste" and trenches with skulls in the sides where "he who had a corpse to stand on was lucky." Pat Barker: “A society that devours its own young deserves (no) unquestioning allegiance.”
"Happy Memorial Day to all," babbled our ever-unseemly Idiot-In-Chief, "including the Dumocrats, who disrespect our Military and all of the tremendous success that it has had over the last year," because obviously the best way to honor the dead is to not acknowledge their sacrifice but to denigrate half the ravaged country they died defending. Also, at Arlington National Cemetery, the infinitely hollow, "Wherever the American soldier (falls), he does it for the destiny of a nation like no other - there’s never been anybody like you." Also, noted Private Bone Spurs, 18,000 Williams, over 20,000 Johns, and other names fell, but "not too many" Donalds. Huh.
Adding to the day's eloquence with a much-needed "monster truck rally vibe" was inexplicably non-veteran, Hegseth bestie, tawdry aging rock star Kid Rock. Because "Tokyo Rose wasn't available," he was chosen by the Pentagon to honor American service members' ultimate sacrifice in a hoodie, fedora, gold chain and sunglasses, looking like "a creature you’d expect to hiss at you from the dank depths of a garbage bin" and intoning, "We are remembering the sacrifice and service of so many who are not with us today...It’s a special day. We’re thinking of them... Keep on Kid Rocking in the free world."
Then there was bombastic, dime-store-cliché-spouting Christo-fascist Pete Hegseth urging we "remember our republic was forged and purchased with blood, American blood," evidently only male according to his pronouns. Ever a fatuous buffoon, he declaimed "the sacred names of bygone eras to the 13 souls of Epic Fury (who) answered the call when it mattered the most (and) gave the last full measure of devotion," even when he failed them in an Iranian strike in Yemen: "They stood against the darkness of the world wearing the breastplate of righteousness (and) raced to the brink so we could walk in freedom and prosperity (and) may almighty God bless our warriors." Jesus weeps.
It remains unclear how many of the up to 22 million dead, both military and civilian, and over 20 million wounded, "the butcher's bill" of World War One, came to be blessed by almighty God, especially in its Western Front's godforsaken trenches teeming with sludge, rats, mud, blood, water and disease. The war's "inconceivable loss" and "purposeless waste of a generation" is perhaps best exemplified by the Battle of Verdun, where the French, set upon by German forces, adopted a "They Shall Not Pass” mantra that in the end saw over 700,000 dead on both sides - ultimately, vast "heaps of bones."
For many, the horrors of "the greatest conflagration the world had seen" live on through the searing literature, both prose and poetry, that emerged from them. Wilfred Owen's Dulce et Decorum Est epitomizes thebitter, bloody tone that often prevailed amidst its "guttering, choking, drowning" victims - Hegseth's benighted "warriors." "Bent double, like old beggars under sacks/ Knock-kneed, coughing like hags," cursing, gargling, limping bootless through sludge, "blood-shod...deaf even to the hoots/Of gas-shells dropping softly behind," they reject, "The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est/Pro patria mori."
Siegfried Sassoon lived the privileged life of a British country gentleman, writing poetry and fox hunting, until the start of World War 1, when he served as an officer with the Royal Welch Fusiliers in France. He was awarded a Military Cross, was later wounded in action, and refused to fight any longer to protest "a senseless slaughter." On June 15, 1917, he wrote "A Soldier's Declaration" as "an act of wilful defiance of military authority, because I believe that the War is being deliberately prolonged by those how have the power to end it. I am a soldier, convinced that I am acting on behalf of soldiers."
"I have seen and endured the sufferings of the troops, and I can no longer be a party to prolonging those sufferings for ends which I believe to be evil and unjust," he wrote. He was protesting, he made clear, "against the political errors and insincerities for which the fighting men are being sacrificed...against the deception which is being practiced on them. Also I believe that it may help to destroy the callous complacence with which the majority of those at home regard the continuance of agonies which they do not share, and which they have not sufficient imagination to realise."
His letter was read before the House of Commons and printed in The London Times. He expected to be court-martialed; instead, he was declared "mentally unsound" and sent to Craiglockhart War Hospital, where Dr. William Rivers was charged with restoring Sassoon’s “sanity” and sending him back to the trenches. The story of their real-life encounter, wherein Rivers came to diagnose war's "shell-shock" and share Sassoon's view, is powerfully told in Pat Barker's historical novel Regeneration, the first in a trilogy about the psychological carnage of war. "It (was) the Great White God de-throned. We assumed we were the measure of all things," Rivers says. "(But) nothing justifies this. Nothing nothing nothing."
Siegfried Sassoon's 1918 Suicide in the Trenches mourns "a simple soldier boy/Who grinned at life in empty joy" until he goes to war: "In winter trenches, cowed and glum/With crumps and lice and lack of rum/He put a bullet through his brain./No one spoke of him again./ You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye/Who cheer when soldier lads march by,/Sneak home and pray you'll never know/The hell where youth and laughter go." Too many of those young lie in a cemetery near Ypres, where one Inscription stands out in a sea of "For King and Country" headstones. It was written on the grave of Arthur Young by his father, a diplomat wiser than any vacuous Hegseth: "Sacrificed to the fallacy that war can end war."
After months of intense pressure, Chair Ken Martin and the DNC finally caved and released their 2024 autopsy report. To call the report a disgrace would be an understatement. The report focuses extensively on ad spending and fundraising, without discussing the Democratic platform, policy positions or political context of the 2024 election. The word "affordability," arguably the most important issue in the 2024 election, appears twice in the 129-page report. The report makes no mention whatsoever of Gaza or Israel — neither word even appears in its text.
Now, Martin and the DNC are trying to wash their hands of the report and its contents. In a hasty, almost amateurish markup, the DNC has gone out of its way to poke holes in the legitimacy of the very report it commissioned. The report is full of factual errors, poorly supported conjecture, and misguided ramblings, many of which the DNC itself is eager to point out. While Martin may feel that this absolves him of the responsibility to answer for this pitiful document, it should only intensify scrutiny of his leadership of the DNC.
Martin recruited the author to write the report. He presumably provided the author with resources and access to party officials and functionaries. The DNC has a responsibility to turn in a report that truly grapples with the mistakes of the past so that the Democratic Party can learn from those mistakes and emerge stronger in its fight against Trumpism. The DNC has utterly failed in that respect.
Sweeping U.S. cuts to critical global health programs, including funding and staffing reductions at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and the U.S. withdrawal from the World Health Organization (WHO), have dangerously weakened the world’s ability to respond to rapidly evolving infectious disease threats, including the escalating Ebola outbreak unfolding in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the region, Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) said today.
“This outbreak is unfolding amid devastating cuts to global health and humanitarian assistance in the DRC that have weakened disease surveillance, strained already fragile health systems, and reduced the capacity to detect and respond to infectious disease outbreaks,” said Thomas McHale, SM, public health director at PHR. “Physicians for Human Rights has documented how abrupt U.S. foreign aid cuts disrupted frontline health services and infectious disease programs in conflict-affected eastern DRC, leaving communities more vulnerable at precisely the moment sustained international public health engagement when it is needed most. ”
The current Ebola outbreak, which the WHO declared a “public health emergency of international concern,” involves the rare Bundibugyo strain of Ebola, for which there is no approved vaccine or targeted treatment. Cases have already been identified in and around Bunia, Goma, and Bukavu in eastern DRC as well as in Kampala, Uganda, which are densely populated urban areas, and health workers themselves have become infected. The crisis is unfolding with the rapid and unchecked spread of infections and the sharply rising death toll, with 139 confirmed deaths reported to date.-A devastating set of emergencies are converging in eastern DRC, where ongoing armed conflict, attacks on civilians and health facilities, and mass population displacement have already pushed fragile health systems to the brink. Violence in and around Ituri and Goma, where several cases of Ebola have been detected, has severely disrupted humanitarian access and public health operations precisely as Ebola is spreading rapidly through affected communities.
PHR’s network of medical and humanitarian partners in DRC are reporting mounting tolls from the outbreak and scarce resources to confront the emergency. A doctor in an Ebola-affected area of DRC tells PHR that “…this outbreak is occurring at a time when we are no longer truly able to carry out proper epidemiological surveillance because of the disruption in USAID funding. To continue this surveillance, we are forced to rely on our own personal resources, including purchasing phone credit, fuel, and paying transportation costs. This is extremely difficult given the current level of need.”
Health workers in DRC told PHR that they need support for disease surveillance, materials to support safe disposal of bodies, including body bags, access to laboratories to process samples quickly, and infection prevention and control supplies, including masks, protective suits, face shield and other personal protective equipment to allow health workers care for Ebola patients safely. The same doctor told PHR that “…without rapid support, surveillance, case confirmation, the safe management of bodies, and the protection of health care workers all risk being seriously compromised.”
U.S. global health funding cuts have contributed to the global health emergency posed by the Ebola outbreak. Decades of U.S. investment helped build the disease surveillance systems, laboratory infrastructure, trained workforce, community outreach networks, and emergency coordination mechanisms necessary to detect and contain outbreaks early before they spiraled into regional and global crises. But those systems are now being hollowed out. The Trump administration’s abrupt cuts to U.S. global health funding in January 2025 have undermined public health efforts around the globe, resulting in impacts such as disruptions to HIV and TB prevention and treatment programs, the elimination of services for survivors of conflict-related sexual violence and undermining critical disease monitoring. U.S. funding cuts are degrading public health response capacities in eastern DRC, across Africa, and globally at a moment when rapid response care and robust international coordination is urgently needed.
Public health experts have expressed alarm that the latest outbreak of this rare strain of Ebola likely went undetected for two months, allowing the virus to spread further and losing critical opportunities to trace, isolate, and treat individuals who were exposed or infected.
“The outbreak of Ebola in DRC is another example of the failures of the America First Global Health strategy,” said McHale. “At its best, U.S. global health leadership can help identify, address, and prevent infectious disease outbreaks before they spiral out of control. But this outbreak comes at a time when the United States has shuttered USAID, slashed CDC funding and work force, cut resources for humanitarian response in DRC, including disease surveillance capacity, and hampered the ability of health care workers on the ground to respond to the emerging Ebola crisis.”
PHR’s recent report, “Wasted Investments, Looming Crisis,” documents how reductions in US support for global health have dismantled research platforms, surveillance infrastructure, and frontline health systems that are essential not only for HIV and TB programs, but also for responding to future outbreaks of deadly infectious diseases. A research brief by PHR (“Abandoned in Crisis”) documented the early impacts of U.S. aid cuts on health services in DRC.
“Due to the Trump administration’s cuts, we no longer have the full measure of global coordination and operational capacity needed to rapidly track transmission, monitor cross-border spread, support frontline clinicians, and swiftly identify and treat people who may have been exposed,” said McHale. “In the conflict-affected regions of eastern DRC, where insecurity and displacement are accelerating disease transmission and limiting access to care, these losses are especially dangerous and further deepening the polycrisis. Global health security depends on sustained international cooperation — not retreat.”
As world leaders gather at the World Health Assembly in Geneva this week, governments must urgently promote a rights-based Ebola response that is grounded in science, transparency, and respect for human dignity, while ensuring affected communities have access to timely, evidence-based care and information. Immediate support is needed to protect frontline health workers through the provision of adequate personal protective equipment and infection prevention and control supplies, as health workers remain at heightened risk of exposure. World governments should urgently scale support for epidemiological surveillance, laboratory testing, contact tracing, safe clinical care, community engagement, and dignified and safe burials, including the provision of body bags and other essential supplies for the safe management of the deceased, and essential personal protective equipment for health care workers. Sustained investment in supply chains, local response capacity, and research into Bundibugyo-specific diagnostics, treatments, and vaccines are essential to preventing further spread and protecting the right to health.
The United States should also strengthen coordination with the WHO and fully disburse congressionally-appropriated global health funds to support an effective response to the Ebola crisis, including urgent measures to track and protect exposed individuals and communities, and strengthen frontline response capacities to prevent further spread of the virus. All parties to the conflict in the DRC, including occupying forces, should uphold existing ceasefire agreements and guarantee safe and unhindered access for health care workers and humanitarian personnel to support populations in areas affected by violence. This should include enabling the immediate reopening of Goma International Airport so that life-saving medicines, medical supplies, and humanitarian aid can reach at-risk communities.
New data released today by Groundwork Collaborative and The Century Foundation shows how President Trump’s reckless economic policies and war in Iran are driving up the costs of summer cookouts and travel season. Prices for backyard barbecue staples jumped 13% on average since last year, more than four times the rate of inflation. Burgers will run families 20% more, Kraft Heinz ketchup jumped 14%, and grilled corn on the cob costs nearly twice as much as it did last year. Even a to-go plate will also cost families more as aluminum foil prices climbed 18%.
If working families manage to get through the holiday weekend within budget, their summer travel plans may still be out of reach. Airfare prices are up 26% and expected to keep rising this summer, while gas prices are hovering around $4.50 nationally. As Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy wraps up his family’s seven-month, all-expenses-paid road trip, working families are wondering whether they’ll be able to afford traveling at all this summer. All in, reports find that the Duffy’s corporate-sponsored vacation would cost at least $900 in fuel expenses – and that’s not including the luxury cruise the family was given to cap off their trip. Trump and his Cabinet couldn’t be more out of touch with working families this Memorial Day weekend.
Groundwork’s Chief Economist, Breyon Williams, released the following statement:
“Trump’s senseless tariffs and illegal war are robbing American families of their relaxing summer vacation. From the ticket counter to the cookout, consumers are scaling back and going without in the face of Trump’s summer sticker shock.”
Janelle Jones, Senior Fellow at The Century Foundation, shared her response:
"Prices are rising because of tariffs and the war—two decisions the president made and can undo whenever he wants but by his own admission he doesn't spend any time thinking about Americans' financial situation. Families are getting squeezed on the price of everything and leaders in Washington don't seem to be paying attention."
Eat Up: Barbecue Essentials More Expensive Thanks to Trump
Beef, hot dog, and bratwurst prices are through the roof (up 20%, 12%, and 28% respectively) as consumers consider firing up the grill this holiday weekend.
Fresh produce prices have increased under Trump thanks to higher fertilizer prices and a struggling farm economy. Tomatoes cost 22% more, while corn prices have increased 98% and lettuce is up 19%.
Trump’s war in Iran has also driven up the price of plasticware popular at cookouts: disposable plasticware prices are up about 20% compared to last year due to the unrest in the Middle East. These price impacts will last beyond summer barbecue season.
Flights, road trips, and even staycations will cost more this summer
A family of four can expect to pay an extra $300 on plane tickets this summer as Trump’s war drags on. All major U.S. carriers have announced price hikes of about $10 per checked bag heading into vacation season, on top of skyrocketing airfare.
Budget airline Spirit shut down this month partially due to unexpected increases in jet fuel costs while airline CEOs anticipate passing higher operating costs onto consumers via price hikes.
Southwest Airlines CEO Andrew Watterson revealed to shareholders in a recent call that there have been five industrywide fare hikes so far this year, and he anticipates more on the way.
United CEO Kirby also admitted prices will not come down, saying “The longer consumers pay these prices and airlines get used to this revenue stream, the more likely it is [to hold].”
Flyers who can afford higher prices will be crammed onto smaller planes with fewer flight options.
Airlines have cut over two million seats and 12,000 flights worldwide in late April and early May, an unprecedented level of cancellations.
United Airlines has removed over 21,000 flights from its summer schedule, while Delta and American cut nearly 12,000 combined.
Gas prices are at the highest level since 2022, hitting around $4.55 nationally, up more than 50% from $2.98 before the president’s war in Iran started.
Working families looking forward to a restful staycation at home may find it more difficult as temperatures rise: Trump’s tariffs have driven up the cost of HVAC systems, and his administration has ended tax credits Americans relied on to upgrade their air conditioning.
To talk to a Groundwork expert about rising prices and the economic fallout of Trump’s agenda, email press@groundworkcollaborative.org.
In retrospect, Sunday's taxpayer-funded blasphemy fest to "rededicate" America as a Christian nation though it's not and never was looks ever more obscene amidst an unholy regime's mounting crimes and abuses. Its sectarian circus - ICE milled, vendors urged "WIVES SUBMIT," zealots screeched "We welcome Jesus!", speakers attested God is eager for the ballroom - just queasily re-shaped a 250-year-old America into the kind of country it once sought freedom from.
"Rededicate 250: A National Jubilee of Prayer, Praise & Thanksgiving," a "constitutional abomination wrapped in layers of blasphemy and demagoguery," sought to proclaim America "One Nation Under God," but only a white male evangelical God; Muslims, Hindus, Catholics, commies, Jews, atheists, agnostics, black, brown, queer, Native people and even mainline Protestants need not apply. As such, it attacked what Jefferson deemed an unalienable right of conscience "which lies solely between Man & his God," defied the core constitutional tenet of separation of church and state, and "torpedoe(d) the best of American traditions - inclusivity and diversity" with, essentially, "a Jubilee of Christian Nationalism."
Its state-sponsored, right-wing fever dream marked the successful MAGA hijacking of Congress’ bipartisan, 2016 America250 commission, meant to honor the anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence and its core values of equality and agency before the law. Instead, Trump concocted his own Christo-fascist Freedom 250 to celebrate a racist, corporate, jingoistic narrative of America, rewriting history to create an imaginary, monolithic, jingoistic, white, male, Christian national identity that celebrates "God’s presence in our national life throughout 250 years of American history," and what is this inequality or oppression of which you speak?
Freedom 250 swiftly collected most of the $150 million appropriated by Congress, along with support from patriotic sponsors like ExxonMobil, Mastercard, Palantir, Amazon, Coinbase. Year-long festivities have included a weeklyAmerica Praysinitiative; a series of Interior Department events celebrating “the triumph of the American spirit” plastered with flags, logos, Trump National Park passes; a fleet of nationwide “Freedom Trucks,” mobile museums offering right-wing takes on US history created with PragerU; a national Freedom 250Patriot Games - Hunger Games anyone? - competition for high school athletes; a revamped Great American Farmers Market in DC with a "MAHA Monday."
On social media, meanwhile, DHS has begun declaring itself "One Homeland Under God," complete with image of church and cross and highlighted Bible verse; for April 19, it urged, “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding." The Washington Monument was transformed into “the world’s tallest birthday candle," with projections celebrating historic achievements by white men like Christopher Columbus and Henry Ford, with no black, Native, female people in sight. To re-enforce the white-centric narrative, organizers have also promised a Summer Surge of thousands more ICE and DHS thugs to make the nation still whiter.
Sunday's Jubilee continued the rebrand of a newly pristine, godly history, with 14 of 15 speakers Christian, arched stained-glass windows and a looming white cross all "glorifying the name of Jesus over our nation’s capital." "Our nation more than any other was shaped by the idea that faith brought freedom," said Marco Rubio in a prerecorded speech. "This is who we are." Virginia pastor Gary Hamrick concurred, but added the imaginary threat of a "spiritual war," perhaps best personified by the scary scattered signs of protesters urging, “Celebrate Democracy, Not Theocracy.” "This is a battle in our day between good and evil," he said. "Our hope is built on Jesus' blood."
Also, Jesus merch. As the faithful braved three-hour lines in the heat and prayed, arms lifted to the sky, vendors handed out "Jesus Saves" bracelets and buttons that said, “WIVES SUBMIT, HUSBANDS LOVE, CHILDREN OBEY.” There were "Thank you Jesus!" signs, a huge "Jesus Make America Godly Again" banner, $47 Freedom 250 baseball caps, t-shirts that read, "God Guns Family Freedom" and "Forever In Our Hearts, Charlie Kirk." "We welcome Jesus into this place!" declared one speaker. Another noted, "It's hard to believe it would take two centuries for the Lord to raise up a great man to bring that ballroom to stand where it needs to stand." (Jesus.)
Pete Hegseth,on video, was typically unshy about praising Jesus. He dubiously zeroed in on The Prayer at Valley Forge, a 1975 painting by Arnold Friberg of George Washington praying in the snow widely deemed a romanticized legend, not fact. Historians argue Washington was a deist and freemason who rarely mentioned God or Jesus, whose favorite Biblical quote - "But they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree, and none shall make them afraid" - symbolizes peace, safety, religious freedom, and who always prayed standing. Still, Hegseth ran with it: Washington "did not lose faith," and "let us pray as he did...without ceasing...on bended knee, for our Lord and savior Jesus Christ."
Trump took an even more sketchy approach: He went golfing and sent in a slurry, pre-taped Bible readingrecycled from the last fake Christian event three weeks ago. Then, moments after it aired, the self-described peace president went on a frenzied, genocidal social media spree, posting on his crappy app over 30 times in two hours. He threatened Iran: "The Clock is Ticking, and they better get moving, FAST, or there won’t be anything left of them." He posted bizarre, AI, warmongering images: Manning a spacecraft, firing away with massive explosions and mushroom clouds, personally arresting an alien, a real one. Say what? Praise Jesus.
Still, spineless, smarmy, unholy Mike Johnson was the worst. Having already whined about "naysayers" who view Christian Nationalism as "a derogatory term," he gave a long hollow prayer about his task to "bring us straight to the Lord, whose mighty hand has been upon our (freest and most benevolent) nation since the very beginning." But now "sinister ideologies sow confusion among our people," attacking our history as "one of oppression and hypocrisy and failure." So "grant us the moral clarity to rise above partisan differences," says the guy who keeps shutting down Congress to block Dem policies. Finally, unconscionably, he prayed for “mercy upon our land.”
Mercy. He seeks mercy.
Mercy for the hundreds of people in the Congo and elsewhere dying of an Ebola outbreak after Trump gutted USAID and its dedicated outbreak response team because it helped people who aren't white, thus triggering what could be over 14 million preventable deaths by 2030?
Mercy for those killed at San Diego's biggest mosque amidst a Trump-fuelled rising tide of Islamophobia? Mercy for those ripped off or otherwise betrayed in a rabid mob by a $1.8 billion slush fund, or "pardon on steroids," in the "most brazen act of presidential corruption this century."
Mercy for the estimated 145,000 U.S. citizen brown children who had a parent detained by ICE and are now scattered across the country, or the 22,000 who lost both parents? Mercy for the woman, a domestic violence victim, detained and deported whom ICE is now blaming for the murder of her own child by her ex-partner?
Mercy for the 21-year-old Honduran with no criminal record just arrested and detained by ICE outside a New York immigration court less than 24 hours after a federal judge's ruling such arrests are illegal, because, as one ICE thug responded when shown the ruling, "We don't care"?
Mercy for 18-year-old, Chicago-born, Mexico-raised Kevin González, being treated in Chicago for metastatic stage-four colon cancer when his health began failing? His parents in Mexico sought emergency visas to travel to the US to say their final goodbyes; when DHS denied them, citing “previous unlawful entries into the US," in desperation they tried to cross the border without permission and were detained by ICE in Arizona. Kevin pleaded in vain for their release; ultimately, he checked himself out of the hospital and flew to his grandmother's home in Mexico to be with family at the end. Finally, in Kevin's last hours, a judge in Arizona ordered their release. They arrived at his bedside on the afternoon of May 9. His sobbing mom called him, “Chiquito," "little one”; his father knelt by his son's bed, asking for forgiveness if he ever let him down. Kevin died the next day.
Mercy? Does Mike Johnson want mercy for Kevin and his parents?
Fuck Mike Johnson and all his fucking odious cohort. Fuck their prayers, and their Jesus, and their cruelty, and their fucking despicable hypocrisy, which knows no bounds. What would Jesus do? Not this, any of it.
On Monday and Tuesday, Paris hosted the G7 Finance Ministers’ meeting, bringing together finance ministers and central bank governors from some of the world’s most powerful economies, alongside counterparts from Brazil, India, Kenya, South Korea, Ukraine, Syria, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. But behind the diplomatic pageantry,and despite the G7’s call for innovative financial instruments to urgently address overlapping crises,French host Roland Lescure squandered a major opportunity.
While fossil fuel companies raked in billions in profits in the first quarter of 2026 amid the South-West Asia conflict, campaigners at 350.org condemn the French G7 presidency’s glaring inaction on windfall and excess profits taxes targeting the oil and gas industry.
Fanny Petitbon, 350 France Country Manager, said:
“France has built its G7 presidency on the bold promise to use this forum as a lever to reinforce economic security in times of crisis and to respond to the legitimate concerns of citizens. But fine words ring hollow. When it comes to taxing the obscene profits recently made by oil and gas corporations, Paris chose complete silence. Not a single word appeared in the final communiqué.
Once again, the interests of a powerful minority are being protected. Companies like TotalEnergies, which boast of their so-called foresight while doing little more than speculating on war and human suffering, have cashed in billions,while families around the world pay the price at the pump and on their energy bills.
The G7’s initiative to expand insurance coverage for people and countries experiencing extreme weather events is welcome. But without turning off the fossil fuel tap and forcing the biggest polluters to foot the bill, climate finance risks becoming little more than taxpayers cleaning up a mess that oil giants are still being paid to create.
President Macron has positioned himself as a global leader on climate and economic justice. Yet this silence tells a very different story. Is this really the legacy he wants to leave in his final G7 presidency? The Leaders' Summit, to be held in Évian from June 15 to 17, is the last chance to course-correct and finally choose people over profit.”
Massive Florida-based power company NextEra Energy announced today its plan to acquire Virginia’s Dominion Energy, citing the growth of A.I. data centers as the impetus for the move. In response, Public Citizen Energy Program director Tyson Slocum issued the following statement:
“This absurd proposal to merge two massive, well-capitalized utilities should be dead on arrival for state and federal regulators. Household customers have everything to lose and nothing to gain by allowing two behemoths, NextEra and Dominion, to merge.
“The claim that the tie-up is needed to address data center demand is a false narrative; the merger will do nothing to increase generating capacity, let alone desperately-needed renewable generating capacity. These mega-utilities are merely using rising concern about data centers as an excuse to concentrate political and economic power of two giant utilities to maximize financial returns to shareholders. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and state regulators should reject this outlandish, unnecessary merger as completely contrary to the public interest.“
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